


A Waterbender in a Strange Land

by plutosrose



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Bloodbending (Avatar), Gen, Kidnapping, Murder, Prison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-12
Updated: 2020-06-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:59:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24688762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plutosrose/pseuds/plutosrose
Summary: The only thing that Hama knows is true is that she is a waterbender in a strange land.
Relationships: Hama & Katara (Avatar)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 32





	A Waterbender in a Strange Land

In the end, it takes her about twenty-five years to break out of prison.

Hama (that is not her real name), is proud of the fact that it only took that long. 

Usually, most people who go in do not leave.

One of the guards jerks toward her, and hands her his cloak. She detests the cloak’s color and weight - it’s not something that would ever be worn in the South Pole, because it simply wasn’t practical enough. 

But, it gives her enough of a disguise that she is able to slip out of the prison, looking not too different from any of the other guards with the cloak pulled over her head. 

~

She is a waterbender in a strange land. She repeats that one fact over and over in her head, even when it feels like she has nothing, she has that. It would be impossible to pass through Fire Nation borders and go home when she’s changed her name several times over the past few decades. But as long as she reminds herself who she is, and that it’s okay to do what she needs to survive, it helps make her feel as though she still has a part of herself that she thought she lost a long time ago.

~

She settles in a small town and buys a small house that she fixes up into an inn. She makes a modest income, and for the most part, the town’s people are friendly.

But she’s a waterbender in a strange land, living deep in enemy territory.

~

It isn’t a decision that she consciously makes, really. The first time she steals town’s people away, it’s two returning soldiers who are staying at her inn. She overhears them talking about a raid on a small Earth Kingdom town, and it makes her so angry that she forces both of them to get up in the middle of the night, leave her inn, and walk straight into the mountain.

She doesn’t remember their names, but she does remember one of them saying, ‘I can’t move,’ over and over again until she forces his jaw to clamp shut. 

~

She starts to hear whispers in this tiny Fire Nation village, of more villagers who are leaving and returning as soldiers. At first, she only takes the soldiers. 

But then, one day, in the market, she hears the man who sells ocean kumquats telling the man who sells komodo chickens that things will be better once the war is over, because there won’t be any more of them.

It isn’t clear who he means by ‘them,’ but she grips her basket tightly, forcing a smile as she examines the contents of a nearby stand that is overflowing with lychee nuts and ash bananas. 

A waterbender in a strange land, she repeats to herself over and over again. It isn’t enough to do what she needs to do to survive. She must strike at the heart of the Fire Nation.

~

There is part of her that thinks that perhaps the heart of the Fire Nation isn’t in the tiny village where she lives, but as the full moons pass, it matters less and less. 

The story of the witch and the people in the mountain begins to grow. 

~

While she knows about the story, she doesn’t really care much about stopping it. She’s spotted more than once by people who she guides into the mountain, their limbs jerking clumsily as they haul themselves up the slope.

She doesn’t even have to keep them in there. She is practiced enough at the art of bloodbending that she can force them to keep each other trapped in there. 

~

A couple passing through warns her about the witch. “People are disappearing in the woods,” they say. “We wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to you.” 

She smiles sweetly. “I’m touched that you are so concerned about an old innkeeper like me.” 

Two days later, the couple disappears. 

~

One day, she meets Katara from the Southern Water Tribe and her friends. 

The name ‘Nini’ briefly distracts her, because it sounds so much like her old life. It sounds very much like one of her old names, although so much time has passed, trying to remember it feels a little like trying to hold sunlight in her hands. 

She decides to take them in and decides that she will do everything she needs to protect this girl.

She will not suffer the same fate that she did.

She might cry, but she will never be in danger again. 

~

The chains are tight and cut into her skin as she’s led away. Prison, this time, is little more than a hole.

But the first time she can see the full moon through the cracks in the bars, she’s ready. 

Bloodbending, as long as she’s known the technique, has been a precise art, more precise than the flowing movements that characterize waterbending. 

But nothing is too hard for a master, and jerking her head - a few times to the left, then once up to sky - compels the guard who had come to give her food to zoom straight to the lock, hand moving only by her will to unlock the door and her chains.

“No, please,” he says. “I have--I have a family.” 

She flicks her right wrist, and the man’s head bends unnaturally to one side until he crumples in a heap. 

~

After Zuko becomes the Fire Lord, he insists on taking all of his friends on a proper tour of the Fire Nation. They even get the honor of taking one of the new Fire Nation airships, which Zuko is working on turning into tourist spots (“And now Appa gets to come with us, and he won’t even get tired flying!” Aang says excitedly when he learns about the trip). 

They are flying for several hours before Katara notices the tiny village where, weeks earlier, they had met the only other waterbender from the Southern Water Tribe. 

The others don’t notice - in fact, the only reason Katara does is because she spots the trees, flowers, and grass that have been drained of life. 

Because otherwise, there is nothing left.


End file.
